December 15, 2011

WASHINGTON — Thirty-five percent of homeless people in the Association of Gospel Rescue Missions (AGRM) network reported that this is the first time they have ever been homeless before, according to a new study.

The Snapshot Survey, conducted annually by the AGRM network, polled nearly 19,000 individuals at 114 rescue missions. Seventeen percent of those surveyed were not currently homeless, but all had received services offered at the missions, such as food and medical care.

Bill Roscoe, director of Boise (Idaho) Rescue Mission, said his shelter housed more than 2,000 people in the past year who had never been homeless before. “We’ve seen quite a significant increase in numbers with women and children. In two years the average daily population in our women and children’s shelter more than doubled,” Roscoe said. “Unfortunately nothing in the report is a huge surprise,” said John Ashmen, AGRM president. “Some public figures like to give the impression that government programs are curbing homelessness and hunger. We certainly aren’t seeing it.”